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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/30100104">In Her Dreams, A Castle</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/JodiMarie2910/pseuds/JodiMarie2910'>JodiMarie2910</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Once Upon a Time (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Amnesia, Belle in the Asylum, Drabble, Dreams of the Dark Castle, F/M, Short One Shot</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-03-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-15 22:54:23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>633</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/30100104</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/JodiMarie2910/pseuds/JodiMarie2910</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>She doesn’t feel unwell, except that she has no memories and no visitors and no knowledge of when and how she came to this place or when and how she’ll leave.</p><p>At least in the castle she isn't alone.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Belle &amp; Rumplestiltskin | Mr. Gold, Belle/Rumplestiltskin | Mr. Gold</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>18</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>In Her Dreams, A Castle</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>She can’t remember her life before these four white walls. Whether she had friends or family, was rich or poor.</p><p>The only confirmation that she must have known someone somewhere once before are the strange dreams she has at night and during the restless, endless waking hours when her daydreams become more vivid than her cell.</p><p>She’s always in the same castle—a large, ornate estate like in a fairy tale (has she read those?)—attended by the same reptilian man who alternately converses with her and orders her about. He calls her ‘dearie’ and has a peculiar high-pitched laugh that she should find unnerving but finds comforting instead. They’re alone in the castle, taking tea or attending to their respective chores. She does housework, and he sits at his spinning wheel or fiddles with the wide range of strange objects he collects. Usually they’re in a grand tapestry-filled room with the spinning wheel, but sometimes they’re in a library with bookshelves that stretch from the floor to the ceiling. And what a high ceiling it is!</p><p>Reading is something she enjoys; she remembers this even though there’s little to read where she is. Whenever she requests reading material, her requests are either ignored, or she’s given brief medical pamphlets to pacify her; she suspects they don’t want her to have anything that would jog her memory.</p><p>The doctors tell her she has amnesia—and some unrelated psychosis she doesn’t understand. (She suspects her diagnosis is made up.)</p><p>She doesn’t <em>feel</em> unwell, except that she has no memories and no visitors and no knowledge of when and how she came to this place or when and how she’ll leave.</p><p>No wonder she spends so much time in that castle.</p><p>Even if it’s a hallucination, it’s better than her current imprisonment.</p><p>At least in the castle she isn't alone.</p><p>Sometimes a woman stops by. A woman with piercing brown eyes and an evil smile. She peers into her cell and stares.</p><p>She stares back because she knows the woman must be part of the reason she’s locked up, but the woman never speaks.</p><p>The woman doesn’t want her to know anything either.</p><p>Today, when the woman leaves, she sits cross-legged on her bed and shuts her eyes. She tries to pick up where she left off her conversation with the reptilian man who has the funny laugh she loves—loves?—so much.</p><p>Perhaps it is mental strain that would make her imagine such a creature—not fully human but not fully monstrous either. But she suspects that she loves him. Or would if he really existed.</p><p>Has she ever been in love? She doesn’t know.</p><p>She knows only that sometimes when they’re sitting down to a delicious dinner at the long table that sits in the middle of the large room, the reptilian man pulls out his own chair for her, and as she sits his hand brushes the small of her back. And when he leans over her and tells her to take a bite of his food first—lest she had gotten it into her mind to poison him—the words don’t hold the weight she thinks they should. He breathes softly on her ear and calls her ‘dearie’ in a playful way that she instinctively knows is just for her. When she glances up to argue with him, his eyes have lightened from their usual pitch black appearance; she doesn’t know if he’s toying with her or if she’s toying with him, but she feels warm down to her toes.</p><p>And she doesn’t have a name, and she doesn’t know where she is or what’s she done or when she’ll ever be free, but in the castle in her dreams, she knows she’s his.</p><p>For a brief moment, it is enough.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I'm sure this has been done before, but I had to...</p></blockquote></div></div>
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